Blackrock Foundry Release Schedule

Highmaul is currently enjoying its brief time in the limelight as the pinnacle raid in World of Warcraft, but its days are numbered. Blackrock Foundry is coming, and with it, the actual tier 17, with armor sets and everything.

Blackrock Foundry will open up in Normal and Heroic mode on February 3rd. Additionally, Rukhmar, the bird-god the Adherents of Rukhmar worship, will start appearing in Spires of Arak.

On February 10th (a week later,) Mythic Mode will open up for the hardcore.

February 17: Raid Finder Wing 1, the Slagworks (Gruul, Oregorger, and The Blast Furnace)

February 24th: Raid Finder Wing 2, the Black Forge (Hans'gar and Frank, Flamebender Ka'graz, and Kromog)

March 10th (so a two-week gap there): Raid Finder Wing 3: Iron Assembly (Beastlord Tarmac, Operator Thogar, The Iron Maidens)

March 24th: Raid Finder Wing 4, Blackhand's Crucible (Blackhand) unlocks, giving us the whole raid on LFR.

So you'll have almost two months to clear the raid before the plebeians in LFR get to take down Blackhand (I'll most likely be among them.) With ten bosses, BRF should last us a good long while, and while I'm sure there are plenty of guilds who will be finished with Highmaul on their preferred difficulty by the time the Foundry comes out, a lot of us will most likely still be working on it, which means that there will be even more longevity to the raids of 6.0.

There still hasn't been any hint as to what we'll be getting in terms of future raids. Blizzard had said before the expansion was released that they might only do two raid tiers if they can get their "one expansion per year" rate up to speed (though I think one every 1.5 years would be a bit more realistic.)

As of last fall, they had said that if they can get expansion six out soon enough (meaning possibly even this year - though color me skeptical) they might just race to the finish and have us handle the final raid next. Personally, I think there's a fair amount of potential left in the Draenor setting (though some adversaries seem to be more the objective of garrison campaign quests than raid-worthy enemies.)